the NachtKabarett
All Writing & Content © Nick Kushner Unless Noted Otherwise
The Eat Me, Drink Me incarnation of MarilynManson.com illustrates likewise as representative of Manson's personal and romantic (in the true sense of the world) impetus in crafting the dawn of the new era, via subtle and rather esoteric symbolism. Albeit grotesque and morbid in certain respects, the imagery conjures the renewed excitement and love life Manson has spoken of since the album's inception as being recent inspiration. The Hausmann-inspired art section from the site's previous version remained the same (and is still active in May 2009), probably judged still matching with the Hausmann-esque newspage design, as well as the Alice theme with the Live Flowers (of evil), and just underwent a minor change concerning the back button which turned into a heart-shaped spiral, the new era's logo.
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Click thumbnails above for each archived element and update during the Eat Me, Drink Me era. |
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Raoul Hausmann, co-founder of the Berlin Dada movement, 'Selfportrait of the Dada-Oven', 1920. (Thank you to Jean Gengnagel, aka DJ Dada, of Brazil for submitting this image to The NACHTKABARETT)
As inspiration for the surreal heart-headed outlaw in the news section of MarilynManson.com, Raoul Hausmann's 'Selfportrait of the Dada-Oven', 1920. Hausmann was co-founder of Berlin Dada movement in 1917 and was creator of the photomontage technique (thus inadvertently one of the most influential artists of the Twentieth Century, inspiring those ranging from Max Ernst). As a portraiture of a man with clock/pressure gauge in place of head and protruding veins and organs, the Hausmann collage is a definitive visual inspiration for the Eat Me, Drink Me incarnation of MarilynManson.com.
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| Origin of the '3577' mugshot. Clarence Walker, a lesser American criminal. (Thanks to timtim / tvitkh for discovering & providing the scans) |
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The stop watch of course is fairly self explanatorily related to Phantasmagoria and the many, many Alice In Wonderland / Lewis Carroll lyrical references on Eat Me, Drink Me but the most obvious element, of course, is the suited man with the heart as a head is. Beyond it's surreal nature the second connotation it lends itself to is Manson's new love incarnate. There's the cliche of "having hearts in your eyes" (which the album artwork for the title track directly illustrates, and as seen above) when one is in love, this amalgamation seems to take it one stage further, bare in the open for the world to see and showing the dark yet romantic themes of the era Manson has been alluding to since mid 2005. Likewise with the veins and capillaries growing from all surrounding him like a spreading disease, that which is Eat Me, Drink Me.
Literally thinking with ones heart; "When the heart guides the hand", just as the underlying masthead reads:
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| Closeup of the composite character and underlying tagline. The theme of bees coming out of one's head is one repeated from a circa 2000 watercolor by Manson entitled 'Fibonacci' depicting a similar but context differing illustration of being in the throes of inspiration. | |
Manson's new relationship, as he himself is quoted, helped spark the inspiration and drive needed to complete Eat Me, Drink Me and solidify the direction of the new era. Bees in addition are an ancient symbol of inspiration and creation. The bees spouting from the heart vessel of the head thereby lends themselves to the direct connotation of Manson's new love being that source of inspiration and creativity.
The lyrics of the album illustrate in word form this new, vibrant and "sensitive" spearheading of the era in a romantic and fatalistic sense. "If you're Bonnie I'll be your Clyde" as sung in 'Putting Holes In Happiness' stands out in particular in consequence with the romantic heart-headed figure is also a criminal as the bust of this portrait is taken from the mugshot of a lesser American criminal. This of course illustrating, and quite apropos, the love like standing on the brink of oblivion, outlaws and partners in crime which history holds so dearly such as Romeo & Juliet, Sid & Nancy and the aforementioned Bonnie & Clyde. A love that can end just as easily with a gunshot or car wreck after a bank robbery. Exciting, exhilarating, with death three footsteps behind inspires one to live life to the fullest with each moment as it's the last.
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| Left, MarilynManson.com. Right, George Grosz as Jack the Ripper. Self-Portrait with Eva Peters in the Artist's Studio, 1918. | |
This romanticism is one which much darker and gothic in the true sense of the term, along with an underlying sinister element. NACHTKABARETT previously discussed in the ART & THE GOLDEN AGE OF GROTESQUE section of the site, the Sex Murder allusions Manson made during the era, as a nod to early surrealist and German expressionist art. The theme continues in the current imagery, along with the blood stained walls of the album cover, the dripping guillotine scroll bars of the site and hidden behind the stopwatch of the main splash page is Manson in pangs of anguish holding a bloodied knife. Like a fatalistic, tragic love affair. Or conversely a scorned lover, Manson included, illustrative that there is always the danger of one lurking in the shadows ready to destroy someone's happiness.
Seductive sex murder, pangs of ecstasy or one in the same? Marilyn Manson & Evan Rachel Wood. Reverse cover of Eat Me, Drink Me
Tour Dates page featuring a closeup of Manson's face with double-cross ring, the era's nail logo, and a stylized version of the butcher knife microphone Manson would later use during the Rape Of The World tour, though more in the shape of a dagger blade here (which relates even more to the ankh pendant knife used by David Bowie in the vampire movie The Hunger, a recurring influence during the upcoming tour performances, as well as the omnipresent theme of blood ritual). Note that this page of the first version of MarilynManson.com during Eat Me, Drink Me is still active in May 2009.
The Hunger, 1983, the occult and unconventional vampire film, starring David Bowie. The two songs of which the film begins with are the songs which open each performance of the Rape of the World tour. 'Bela Legosi's Dead' by Bauhaus, immediately followed by Schubert's Trio In E Flat, Op. 100. Visually the film poster is also evocative of the Dada-esque tears and jagged lines on the cover of Eat Me, Drink Me.
On May 8, one month before the album's release, the curtain and fangs menu page is completely revamped into a new, more elaborate and interactive introduction which reflects more of the album's themes (hidden Mad Love heart, timeless clock, painted in blood Ms, high and low blue bars, Lolita heart-shaped glasses, Vampirism through the mosquito's presence, and the -0605- inscription, the album's release date), and is now accessible through the resurrected 2006 Phantasmagoric intro that had been put aside for a while.
The spreading veins on the wall, the giant bee and beehive and our composite heart-headed character are in total continuity with the News page described above, the larva relates to Antichrist Superstar's worm and Manson's eternal theme of transformation, while the cold medical environment and annoying heart pulsation beeps symbolizing Manson's convalescence after being destroyed are strongly reminiscent of Mechanical Animals' imagery and themes. Along with the album's cover, actually a link to the booklet's art which was added on May 18, a changing series of exclusive photographs can be seen on the wall, one of them being a disturbing photograph of Manson as a little boy naked on a couch, which was actually intended to be used in the band's imagery back during its early days :
"I wanted to use a photo in [Portrait of an American Family]'s booklet of me naked on a couch when I was a kid. When you hold up something to people, usually what they see in it is what's inside them in the first place. And that's what happened because the lawyers at Interscope said, "First off, that picture's going to be considered child pornography, and not only will no stores carry the album but we're subject to legal retribution from it." They said if a judge were to look at it, the law states that if a photograph of a minor elicits sexual excitement then it's considered child pornography, why am I the guilty person? You're the person who's got a hard-on. Why aren't you punished?" That's still a point I'd like to make. People's morality is so ridiculous: If they get excited by it, then it's wrong."Marilyn Manson, The Long Hard Road Out Of Hell
autobiography with Neil Strauss, 1998
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| 1970s photograph of Brian Warner as a kid periodically appearing on walls. | The 1879 controversial nude portrait of Evelyn Hatch by Lewis Carroll. |
"I always call him Lewis Carroll Carroll, because he was the first Humbert Humbert. Have you seen those photographs of him with little girls? He would make arrangements with aunts and mothers to take the children out. He was never caught, except by one girl who wrote about him when she was much older."December 1966 interview, Vladimir Nabokov on Lewis Carroll
Penelope Gilliatt for American Vogue
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| Other examples of child models photographied by Charles Dodgson/Lewis Carroll with lascive yet innocent postures, and often on a sofa or a bed. These two photographs are of Xie Kitchin (ca. 1875, and the Reverend's favourite photographic subject) and Edith Liddel (1859, actually Alice's sister). | |
Hidden picture of Celebritarian photograph Perou's son appearing behind the Frankenstein of wounded limbs photographs, possibly a depitcion of Manson's inner child shrouded amidst the decay and destruction within his own mind, represented by the gurney.
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| Left; electrocardiogram found in the hospital room by moving the gurney to the extreme right of the screen. Right; a similar diagram (actually a 1997 cardiogram of Manson himself, and one of the rare references to his 'real' identity). Both representations perfectly illustrate the theme of having one's heart broke, the many heart-beat inspired tempos on some of the album's tracks, the medical imagery during Mechanical Animals, and Manson's period of convalescence after being emotionally destroyed. | |
A totally reworked blood-tainted news page surfaced on September 30, 2007, denoting the bloody, romantic and religious lyrics of the album well as the Celebritarian ethos ("flies are waiting") in continuity with the new site skin's medical environment, and also displaying a slider with photographs, some of which were previously unpublished. The syringe cross is strongly reminiscent of a passage from the Subgenious Foundation's dystopian mockumentary "Let's Visit the World of the Future", from which also originates a sample included in the Mechanical Animals song "I Want To Disappear" and subliminally transcribed on the corresponding lyrics page of the album's booklet :
Detail from the Mechanical Animals booklet, featuring a diffracted Omēga logo and the Subgenious Foundation movie's quote (in bright yellow).
"Now children, it's time for recess. Please roll up your sleeves."Distorted sample heard in I Want To Disappear (Mechanical Animals)
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| Still frames from the 1973 film 'Let's visit the World of the Future', a dystopian, extrapolated mockumentary by the Subgenius Foundation. | |
Corresponding scene from the dystopian, extrapolated mockumentary by the Subgenius Foundation.Let's Visit the World of the Future, (Movie, 1973)
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| Still frames from Let's Visit the World of the Future of the syringe cross which inspired the 'Eat Me, Drink Me' era MarilynManson.com news splash. | |
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| Syringes have always been prominently used in Marilyn Manson's visuals to illustrate the omnipresent theme of drugs since its beginnings. Here are nevertheless three interresting details of the band's imagery through the eras (click thumbnails above for original sources and informations). | ||
Contained within the European Union release of the Heart-Shaped Glasses single was a link to a minisite (http://www.marilynmansonvault.com) displaying the album's lyrics, a gallery of promotional pictures and a mosaic puzzle game. Unlocking the mosaic would give access to exclusive content: a free Eat Me, Drink Me wallpaper and streaming previews of the tracks Heart-Shaped Glasses, If I Was Your Vampire and Evidence.
